Letting Go
by SpaceRoses
Summary: Letting go of a person you love is never easy. It's even harder when the person you love doesn't even know you love them. SanoMegumi centered.


_**Disclaimer: **I own nothing._

_**Author's Note: **This Sano/Megumi one-shot is inspired by the Brad Paisley song "I Wish You'd Stay". It has some spoilers for the end of the Jinchuu arc but nothing major. Read and Review if you want but Flames will be ignored. Thanks!_

**Letting Go**

I gripped the doorknob in my hand but I didn't turn it. I wasn't even sure that I could turn it. I had stood at this door a hundred times, I had opened it and walked into the room beyond it a hundred times but this time it was different.

This time I had no injury to explain away my presence, my hand was actually healing and I hadn't even gotten into any fights for the past day or two.

Just beyond the door I could hear her and I knew that she was packing up her few belongs and by this time tomorrow she'd be gone.

I resisted the urge to slam my fist into the door. Why was I frozen? I had come here for a reason and I should just open the door but my hand still wouldn't move.

Megumi was just inside that door, the one person I loved more then anyone else, the person I wanted to be with for the rest of my life. If I wasted much more time I was going to lose her forever.

If I wasted much more time she'd be gone to Aizu and I'd probably never see her again.

I don't know why she has to leave; I thought the friends she had here would be enough to make her stay. I thought I'd be enough to convince her to stay.

We share a strange relationship, me and the Fox. On the surface we argue with each other, jumping between insulting and taunting the other one.

But when we were alone, whether she was checking my hand or I was with her on a late night house call, we would talk.

Sometimes we talked about nothing and other times we told each other things we had never told anyone else.

She told me about growing up alone and how she'd gotten tangled up with Kanryu.

I told her about Captain Sagara and how I became "Zanza".

And sometimes we'd talk about our dreams for the future. Her dreams were so simple; she wanted to find her family and help as many people as she could with her medical skills but she also wanted to get married and have a family of her own.

I thought I could help her with her last dream but maybe I was wrong.

Maybe I was wrong to encourage my own feelings for her. There were several times I thought that she didn't love me in return but every time I was about to stop hoping she'd do something that would get me believing again.

Now she was leaving. She was going back to her home town of Aizu to open a clinic.

Tomorrow morning she'll say her final goodbyes, get in a carriage and be gone.

Tomorrow morning I'll tell her goodbye, tease her one more time and then I'll watch her walk out of my life like so many other people have done already.

Maybe someday I'll understand why she had to leave but for now the only thing I can do is wish her the best and hope that all of her dreams come true, even if I don't play a part in any of them.

I finally let go of the doorknob. I had come to the clinic to tell her about my feelings, one of the few secrets I had ever kept from her, but now I realize that this is not the time for me to go soft. Kenshin and the others need me to be strong; Megumi needs me to be strong.

Megumi doesn't need me to make this even more difficult for her; she already has mixed feelings about leaving and if I tell her how I really feel she'll probably change her mind, something I can't let her do.

She's needed in Aizu; those people have few doctors and even fewer clinics. Also, she'll stand a better chance of finding her own family there and probably meeting a guy who'll love her as much as I do.

Someday, if fate sees fit to stop playing tricks on us, maybe we'll meet again and maybe then we'll have another chance but if we never see each other again I'd rather that Megumi doesn't know I love her. It's easier that way.

I turn away from the door and disappear into the night. Some westerner once said that if you loved a person you should let that person go and if they come back to you then they were yours but if you never saw them again then they never belonged to you in the first place. Easy words to say but they weren't so easy to follow.

For now I'll let her go but hopefully we'll met again and on that day I'll finally tell her what I wanted to tell her tonight.

_Fin. _


End file.
